Pretty Young Affluent Things Guide To Supporting Your Local Bogeda

The Bodega Party in a Box.

"Did you know that your corner store (aka bodega) probably sells a lot more than ho hos and beer? Perhaps even fresh produce. Taste what your corner store has to offer by throwing a Bodega Tasting Party.

The Bodega Party in a Box comes with a cook book, one silkscreened resuable shopping bag, 8 Party invitations and envelopes, and corner store-style flags - "aka, perfect party decoration"

Since building community with people takes actual effort, like saying hello, asking them questions about their families and life, and just generally being a gracious person, it's easier and less awkward for your class sensibilities to do it with detached irony while tying that to the belief that somehow the purchase you undertake is going to free these backward and uncultured bodega operators from the oppressed and unjust world they live in.

Because really, they don't like the Latin music they listen to, the sense of community, family, and national pride they hold onto only exists because you've never graced them with you presence and belief systems, and they haven't been stuffing more free cash then is your salary into brown bags every month for the last 14 years. They've been waiting for you to come and save them. Now you can. For $25.00. Cultural insensitivity not included. And don't forget to invite the bodega owners, I'm sure they would love to come to a party where you pretend that being a hard working immigrant in a foreign country is cause for a hipster party, while you eschew your daily purchase of coffee with warm milk for $1.00 at the bodega, instead opting to buy a book and some flags from somewhere else.

Sadly, as is often the case with the lives of pretty young affluent things who are going to save the world through buying things instead of doing things, the Bogeda Party in a Box is not joke.

A Neighbors Project project.

Related: You could and should also buy a shirt you for $36.00 that will let everyone know how much you really care.

UPDATE: Gawker and Gothamist pick up the story, with Gothamist commenting on: "people who have had it with the corner bodega’s refusal to carry the New York Times and stock more produce beyond the usual 'bananas that look like they're in pain.'" And as per usual, Gawker drives the point home much better than I, as the writers over there have hammers as opposed to the shoe used over here at NYC The Blog. Never mind the mallet that their commenters use to fashion the gold:

• Blactor at 01:29 PM - Box O' Crap - Priceless
• Private Hangnail at 01:33 PM - Listen, if the complicated problems of immigration and urban poverty can't be solved with some sort of branded party equipment, I say don't solve them.
  
• ineffable.me at 01:37 PM - Bodegas have everything, you'd have to be a jackass to need a book to tell you how to "eat well from your corner store.
• Unfun at 02:10 PM - Seriously, white people, in most cases I'd bet your neighbors aren't "connecting" you because they don't fucking want to. And when you come up with ideas like this, why should they? If you need to be told that bodega food is edible, you're probably a fucking dickhead, and you should continue to ignore your minority neighbors for their sake.

UPDATE: Kit Hodge, CEO of the Neighbors Project, responds via email.